Updating Your Domain's DNS / Nameservers

If you're migrating your website to InMotion Hosting from another host, one of the last steps you'll take is pointing your domain's nameservers to InMotion Hosting's nameservers. This will direct your domain's traffic here, and away from your previous web host. If you are unsure exactly what name servers are, be sure to check out our informative article on the subject.

Please be aware that changes to your nameservers can take up to 24 hours before they take affect, so changes you make will not be immediate.

Where do I update my Nameservers for domains registered elsewhere?

If you registered your domain name with InMotion Hosting, you do not need to change anything as it is already pointed here. However, if you have registered the domain name with another registrar you will need to update the nameservers with that company. Please see the following links for the major registrars below:

I want to Domain Name registered with Network Solutions directly to an InMotion sub_account. I've done it before, but can't recall how I did it. It seems to me that these instructions would send it to the prime account.

Thanks for posting your comment. I'm more than happy to assist you. You will use the nameservers listed above. When you create an add-on domain, it automatically creates a DNS record on the nameserver to direct it appropriately.

I'm in the process of moving my website to inmotion. If I update the nameservers in my previous provider controlpanel, do I need to make any other changes in order to make sure I receive emails without interruption? I have mirrored all emails accounts on inmotion in preparation of the switch.

Thanks for posting your question. Once you update the nameservers, you should not have to do anything else. However, during the 24 hours after you may still receive emails at the old server while your domain is propagating.

I hope this helps! If you need further assistance please feel free to contact us.

Hi, I have recently pointed two new domain names at your servers using the IP addresses listed at the top of this post. I have a power package which I presume allows me 6 websites in total. Will there be any problems with my existing site, which has been working brilliantly up until now, once the changes on the two other domains come into effect? Any notes about the correct procedure would be most forthcoming. I am a little nervous about the outcome.
Many thanks.

Arn said: ....the cPanel is automatically notifying the server that DNS entries need to be added, and these entries are created automatically. This is only done when the domain is pointing to our name servers.

We plan to host our exiting domain with inmotion, so does that mean we have to change the name server settings at our registrar before setting up the inmotion account or does the point in time not matter at all, so we can first order the inmotion account, then set up all content and finally change the name server settings.

I assume while ordering the account we have to select the "I already own this domain or will handle the registration seperately" option and enter our domain name. Are there any other special settings except the name servers to make all work.

No, there will be no issue with any of your domains due to pointing others to the name servers. The name servers basically house a list of the domains and which servers they are located on. When a visitor types in the domain name, it redirects to the name server, which then redirects to the server that houses the account for that domain.

It sounds like you have done everything correctly and should not experience any problems.

Tim S said: "Thanks for posting your comment. I'm more than happy to assist you. You will use the nameservers listed above. When you create an add-on domain, it automatically creates a DNS record on the nameserver to direct it appropriately." Tim, how does it know to do that? does my sub account domain need to be identical to the domain registered at another location? for instance if I wanted to www.website1.com to go to inmotionhosting, would my add on domain need to be the same, website1.com? Dang! this stuff is so confusing!

Sorry for the confusion! Let's see if we can clarify it. Add-on domains are simply treated like completely separate websites. The domain name for an add-on domain must be registered with a domain registrar. When you ADD an add-on domain in the cPanel, the cPanel is automatically notifying the server that DNS entries need to be added, and these entries are created automatically. This is only done when the domain is pointing to our name servers.

When you have done this, web site FILES have not been transferred. So, if you have another website on another host, NONE of those files are at our location until you move them to our location, or your create them at our hosting location. The website is not physically at any location until you have either transferred the files there, or you have created the website files at that location.

Additionally, just to be clear, the domain name that you use for the add-on domain here can be the same as what you're using on another hosting service, but the name won't use our hosting service until you change the name servers so that it is pointing to our hosting service. In other words, if I type in your domain name at this point, and your domain name is still using the OLD host, then the website that is displayed comes from the files at that host(the old hosting service). You would not see the files coming from the InMotion hosting location until the Domain Name Servers are pointing to our hosting service.

I can easily understand how confusing this can be - and it's probably better looking at an illustration more than anything else. We do have a video on updating name servers, check it out if you want more clarification.

One last thing.... terminology and file locations:

add-on domains - these are stand-alone domains that must be registered to a domain registrar, but the files are physically saved UNDER the primary domain folder.

sub-domains - subdomains are NOT registered to a domain registrar and they are generally folders under either the primary domain or an add-on domain. Here are a few examples of sub-domains:

abcde.com/subdomain1 (subdomain1 is a subdomain to abcde.com)example2.com/folder1 (folder1 is a subdomain to example2.com)

I hope this helps to explain the differences and file structure you will see when adding an add-on domain or using a subdomain. If you have any further questions, please let us know.

Yes that helps some. Here's the situation I created a Wordpress site on inmotionhosting to develop with for a client. They wanted to stay at Network Solutions so I wasn't too picky about how I set it up. i simply created a URL http://abc.clevelandesigns.com in the directory /xxx/public_html/abc.net. As it turns out, they were on a Windows server so they decided to have (or you rather) host the site. Since it's already set up because I was developing it, I simply want to route their URL (domain) to my already existing Wordpress installation but have the URL display their domain, not mine. Is that possible or do I need a Wordpress installation at inmotionhosting specifically called http://www.blowmoldingdivision.org/ in order for the DNS redirect to work properly?

Thanks for the information. The problem here is that WordPress is a URL-centric software that uses the path designated in the installation to automatically generate the URLs for its pages and posts. In order to resolve this you can do one of three things:

1) If you intend to use the domain name of "blowmoldingdivision.org", then you can setup a subdomain here with that domain name, and then install Wordpress using that name. This would save you from the moving issues later when you need to change the path. In addition to doing this change on the hosting server here. You would need to either change the name servers on the domain to point to here, or keep the domain registered elsewhere, but make an A record that points to the server here - specifically for the Wordpress site you're trying to use. The end result is that the live site for "blowmoldingdivision.org" would be coming from here.

2)You can also simply re-direct from the original name, but the domain name that appears in the browser won't match "blowmoldingdivision.org". You can simply state this is the development name, and that it would change to the original name when the site is ready to go live.

3)You can use host file modifications so that only specific computers will with the host file modification would see the website directly from this server. This would preserve the live site (as it is setup now) for the general public, and only the people with the host file modification would see the Wordpress site coming from your server. You would install wordpress using blowmoldingdivision.org as the domain name. The only way you'd be able to view the site will be with the host file change. Please use the follow article on Modifying Your Host File in order to make the necessary changes. Literally what this does is tells the computer to go to a specific IP for a specific URL.

I hope this gives you the answer you're looking for. I think that #3 would work best for you, especially if you're simply trying to show the development site to a few people and not the general public. Note that once you're ready to make the site live, you would need to remove the host file changes, and then also change the DNS for the domain name so that it points to the appropriate location.

If I have the power plan I am able to operate up to 6 websites. If one of those websites is for someone else, will they be able to access CPanel and only access their website information if I create a login for them?

With any of our shared hosting accounts, there would only be one central cPanel user that has access to all of the sites.

You could create a separate FTP user that only has access to one of your sites. Then the someone else that you give that FTP information to would be able to upload any website files just for that site, and couldn't manage any of the other site files on the account.

However if they needed access to other things in cPanel such as creating their own databases, or managing their own email accounts. You would instead need a reseller account which allows for separate cPanel users.

I have a domain registered in Poland via home.pl. The domain is called kucharzniedzielny.pl

I created an addon domain within my hosting with you (my main domain is sundaycook.net registered with you) but when I try to repoint the nameservers in home.pl it returns an error message saying that the DNS servers are not configured properly -SOA records are missing.

It may take your registrar a bit of time to determine that the configuration is indeed here. I recommend waiting a few hours to ensure that your registrar is pulling the correct records. If you continue to experience issues, I recommend contacting your registrar directly for further information.

I recently registered a new domain with namecheap and i already have a domain hosted in inmotion hosting.. since i have option for addon domain can i host the other domain here on inmotioon and how is that i redirect the domain from name cheap. please help me through all the steps to successfully host the other site.

The answer to your question is YES! You would need to change name servers for the domain name, then make some DNS changes. Fortunately, we do have a tutorial you can follow: Modify your MX records. There's also a video in that tutorial that will explain the process.

You can purchase domain names with the .com, .net, .org, .biz, and .us extensions. If you need any other extension you will need to find a registrar that allows them, Once purchased, you can then point them to our name servers for hosting.

I have domain already registered with InMotionHosting and it's working! Yesterday, I created an add-on domain, and still after more than 30 hours I cannot see any response. In fact, your visual domain routing tool says it could be an error with the DNS setup or the domain name is not registered.

As long as I understand, if I have my main domain with InMotionHosting I don't need to configure DNS.

I think your tool 'really works' because you have created it for a 'NEW DOMAIN REGISTERED', but isn't your responsability -for a while-, what append with possible subdomains Inmotion Hosting Inc customers create then. Yep?

We originally had our website hosted through a different company, but are now looking to host with inmotion. My domain is a .ca (registered elsewhere) ... is it just changing my name servers that needs to be done if I wanted to host my site through inmotion? Just a little confused on the process of changing our hosting company since you don't work with .ca

Thanks for the question. Yes, you will need to change your name servers as they are listed in the article above. Since we do not manage foreign domains, you will need work with your domain registrar to change the name servers. If you need more information on name servers, please see What is a name server? Please be aware that changing a name server does require up to 24 hours of domain propagation.

Changing the name servers to our hosting service will enable you to move your website files to our hosting servers and then let our hosting service host your website. I hope that helps to clarify the issue.

My site went down at Go Daddy and they had to reinstate it. Now Google can not find my new IP to my website they have told me I need to change it in google but have no way of knowing how to do that. CAN YOU HELP

I checked your domain and it seems that there may not be any website files within your document root, which is why you are seeing the Index of / when you visit leboncombi.com. However other than that, your website is coming to our servers as it should.

I must configure for a .de (Germany ) ?

Thanks for the question. Your question is very general. Our hosting can use German domain names, but you have to point the name servers (as per the article above) to our hosting servers. There are no special German settings beyond that. If you're wanting to use the German language settings in the cPanel interface, you can do that within the cPanel. There are no specific language settings for the Account Management Panel (AMP).

Hello, I have been dealing for the last day with this problem:
I asked you to transfer my web from another hosted, I thought that everything was ok, until I realized that I did not change my dns.
I made that on monday, and after that, I can not see the pictures in the web, the last changed in the dashboard, I do not received the emails from the web. I made a test purchase and I do not even see that in prestashop dashboard.
It is like the web is not conected with my prestashop dashboard.
I need to fix this problem as soon as posible, please.
Florencia

Where do I find my second InMotion IP address to update my DNS on my old host? I have the primary for the NS1.[domain].com but don't have a second IP address for the NS2.[domain].com. Thanks in advance...

I pointed my nameservers to ns.inmotionhosting.com and ns2.inmotionhosting.com after migrating from godaddy but I keep getting the error "There was a problem with processing your request. Ensure that the nameservers you are trying to set have been created. If they have not, you can go here to do so."

Once I click to proceed it redirect to a page that says "Oops...there was an error with your request". Please what should I do?

We're sorry that you're having problems with the name servers, but we need to know where and how you're updating them. Please provide us a little more information on the issue and we would be happy to help.

The domain points to NS01.DOMAINCONTROL.COM and NS02.DOMAINCONTROL.COM.I transferred the domain from godaddy to inmotiongosting. All attempts to change the nameservers to ns.inmotionhosting.com and ns2.inmotionhosting.com has been unsuccessful. the domain is pinforest.com

I have 3 domains at GoDaddy that I changed the NameServers on 3 days ago, but none are propagating...just getting the Server Not Found message. I used the following posted at the top of this page:

ns.inmotionhosting.comns2.inmotionhosting.comWhat am I missing? I've done this many time before with other hosts, so not sure why it's taking more than 3 days to propagate.You can check the WHOIS and all 3 show DNS pointing to you.SELLINGUSEDMOTORHOME.COMSELLCLASSAMOTORHOME.COMSELL-MOTORHOME.COMHelp appreciated

As per my earlier response, we have no way to correct an assigned name server if the domain was registered through a 3rd party (like GoDaddy). If you're having problems with propagation of the name server, then you will need to contact the domain registrar where you registered the domain for further assistance.

Hey Arnel...thanks but being new to inmotionhosting and setting stuff up like this in general...I learned that I had not yet done the Add-on Domain with you guys for each of the 3 domains...so the GoDaddy guys asked me about that and suggested I go back and do that and give it a day or two to propagate...so did that on your end and now waiting. Thanks Dave

Ok guys so it's now been 2 days since I used the ADD-ON Domain feature to put these 3 domains on:SELLINGUSEDMOTORHOME.COMSELLCLASSAMOTORHOME.COMSELL-MOTORHOME.COM

Things looks fine in both ends...InMotion Hosting and over at GoDaddy where I updated the Nameservers a couple days ago. I do NOT have any sites loaded against those domains...but my question is...should I see any kind of a Coming Soon or anything other than Server Not Found?

You can go do a WHOIS at GoDaddy and you will see I have the nameservers listed correctly so what am I still missing?

The WHOIS lookup does indeed point to our nameservers for all three domains. However, when doing a dig for the authoritative server, they all come up blank. If you are certain you have added the addons to your cPanel account as per our article, then you simply need to contact our Live Support so they can give the DNS a push from the server side. It is rare, but sometimes this needs to be done.

Hi, I need to transfer some domains with you so as to have a multi-domain. The problem is that the domains have extensions .com, .eu, .bike and do not appear in the list of Step 1: Domain Availability for Transfer.

Thank you for contacting us. InMotion Hosting can only support .com, .org, .biz, .net,.us or .info domains. If your domain type is not included in this list, you can still host the domain with InMotion Hosting, but you will need to change your nameservers.